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Steely Dan - Steely Dan - Aja If ever a record knew its worth, it was Aja, the sixth album by Steely Dan. Released in late 1977 when half the world seemed to be down the disco and the other half were pogo-ing, here came an album that oozed detached sophistication, using every trick that keyboard player and vocalist Donald Fagen and guitarist Walter Becker had mastered over their first decade together. Following on from 1976's The Royal Scam, any notion of Steely Dan being ‘a band’ had gone, with a huge stream of well over 40 highly skilled session musicians creating textures to support... Def Leppard - Def Leppard - Mirror Ball So, hot on the heels of headlining Download, the Leps (Def Hoople, or Mott the Leppard as they now seem to be known) release this, a mix of live tracks recorded from their 'The Sparkle Lounge Tour' plus 3 new studio tracks and a bonus DVD containing live performances and backstage footage. There is no doubting the legacy of tracks on this album and what they have given the rock world. The first British band in the 80's and NWOBHM band to really have a go and crack the US and succeed big time, they are only one of five rock... El Schlong - El Schlong - Time/Place Kiwi metallers El Schlong, probably have one of the most ridiculous band names I have ever heard, but in their eyes, that's unimportant. Here's hoping they take their music a bit more seriously. They're fronted by a female singer, Leah, but from the sounds of her work, I would have put money on these tracks being sung by a guy. She is also solely in charge of the guitar work in the band, which thankfully, sounds a lot more pleasant than her voice. Despite their stupid name, El Schlong can actually find their way around very selected instruments pretty well, and are... Tesseract - TesseracT (Sonisphere 2011) The Red Bull Bedroom Jam stage is the ideal venue for TesseracT. It is the most intimate stage at Sonisphere, and being enclosed, perfect for the ear assault carried out by one of the leaders of metal's latest sub-genre's, Djent. For those still catching up on all the modern sub-genre's created in metal, Djent is the style generally associated with the likes of Meshuggah, and describes the sound made when by heavily palm-muted, distorted guitar chord. Whilst the band is still breaking through and the genre is still in its foetus stage, the following is greatly underestimated. The Red Bull stage... Coldplay - Coldplay - Parachutes (2000) Lightly tasteful tablature stories and fables is the best way to describe the debut album that put Coldplay on the maps of the music industry. Just like the reality of a Parachute, this album will seem to be taking its time. Truth is, the combination of musical professionalism and lyrical content is truly going the speed of light. Track three, “Spies", resembles an overcast system hovering over beautiful tropic skies. From one environment to another, using every format of creative instrumental technique to blend into one 5 minute and 18 second song. “ And if we don’t buy here, They’re going to find us,... Nervecell - Album Review: Nervecell - Psychogenocide As someone who lives relatively close to Dubai, I've heard many things about it, but I've never heard the word "boring" being used as a description. And why would I? Anyone who speaks of it usually speaks of its globalized ambience and how it doesn't resemble the rest of the middle-east at all. Thanks to the continuous gushing of oil and gas from the Arabian desert into the Emirati economy, Dubai has its own manufactured answer to everything in the world, including death metal. The answer comes under the name Nervecell, and without a single local lad in sight, as... Slayer - Slayer (Sonisphere 2011) The "Fucking Slayer!!!" chant is ringing through Knebworth. Everybody wants one of the loudest, hardest, scariest thrash bands ever on the stage right now. After a bit of incitement from the Sonisphere MC, he delivers the standard, "be careful out there" and "help each other up" warnings to the pit that is already heaving. The chants get louder, the heaving in the moshpit is getting stronger and horns are in the air all the way back to the sound booth...and it is still at least another twenty minutes before they will come on. Finally the band is out and the crowd... Metallica - Metallica (Sonisphere 2011) This is it! Every single soul in front of the Apollo Stage knows they are witnessing history today. This is one of these gigs you will be telling your grandchildren about. "Yes, I was there when the Big 4 played together on one stage, for the first time in metal history." Except for the bassist, RIP Cliff, Metallica still represents the original band that transformed Bay Area Thrash Metal into an international phenomenon. We can obviously not ignore the band's split from Dave Mustaine, but without that happening back in the day, today would not have been such a big issue.... Marduk - Marduk: Iron Dawn Itching for a little war-themed black metal to get the day rolling, but don’t really want to sit through fifty minutes of mundane blasting? Marduk’s three song EP, Iron Dawn is exactly what the black metal doctor has prescribed. The material on this EP clock in at just over thirteen minutes and will leave you drooling for more " exactly what a release of this nature is meant to achieve. “Warschau II " Headhunter Halfmoon” erupts out of the gate with invading WWII bombers and frenetic drums that come across like belt-fed machine guns buried deep into hill-side bunkers, laying down... Wu - Wu-Tang Clan - Legendary Weapons Each release by the now-legendary Wu-Tang Clan is met with trepidation by listeners. Since their game-changing inception album, Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers), subsequent collections are worried over in the hope that they might match the majesty of that first recording, rather than the overlong hotchpotch of Wu-Tang Forever or any of their inconsistent recent work. Even more confusion is thrown into the mix when albums such as this, ostensibly a gathering of most of the Clan’s members (the tracklisting doesn’t feature GZA or Masta Killa), arrive but probably can’t be included in their full album-proper discography. Whether... |